{"id":229386,"date":"2022-06-21T17:26:28","date_gmt":"2022-06-21T15:26:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/uk-work-visa-for-elite-graduates-is-exclusive-and-based-on-flawed-assumptions\/"},"modified":"2022-06-21T17:26:28","modified_gmt":"2022-06-21T15:26:28","slug":"uk-work-visa-for-elite-graduates-is-exclusive-and-based-on-flawed-assumptions","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/uk-work-visa-for-elite-graduates-is-exclusive-and-based-on-flawed-assumptions\/","title":{"rendered":"UK work visa for elite graduates is exclusive and based on flawed assumptions"},"content":{"rendered":"
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The UK government\u2019s announcement of a new work visa option<\/a> aimed at attracting top graduates has elicited some backlash because the list of eligible institutions features no universities from Africa, Latin America or South Asia. The Conversation Africa\u2019s Nontobeko Mtshali asked Orla Quinlan, Director of Internationalisation at Rhodes University in South Africa, to share her thoughts on the implications such visa programmes have for international integration and intercultural efforts in higher education.<\/em><\/p>\n

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What has the UK government announced?<\/h2>\n

The UK government recently introduced a new \u201cHigh Potential Individual\u201d short-term work visa. Home Secretary Priti Patel<\/a> said the intention was put \u201cability and talent first\u201d \u2013 not where people come from. <\/p>\n

The conditions of the high potential individual visa allow a stay of two or three years in the UK for graduates holding a master\u2019s degree or a PhD, respectively. This visa can\u2019t be extended, but holders may apply for longer-term visas. <\/p>\n

Applicants need to have financial resources to acquire the visa and to sustain themselves while searching for employment. The high potential individual visa doesn\u2019t pertain to international students who are already registered at universities in the UK. <\/p>\n

But the visa is restricted to graduates from specific universities featuring in the top 50 places of two international university rankings. <\/p>\n

Who is eligible?<\/h2>\n

The most recent list of eligible universities<\/a> comprised more than two dozen US universities. Other institutions are in Canada, China, France, Germany, Japan, Singapore and Sweden. <\/p>\n

Each of these universities appeared in at least two of the following ranking systems: the Times Higher Education world university rankings, the Academic Ranking of World Universities and the Quacquarelli Symonds world university rankings. <\/p>\n

African universities don\u2019t appear in the top 50 of any of these ranking systems. The criteria they use<\/a> consider aspects like the university\u2019s research output, high achieving academics and alumni<\/a>, reputation among employers, and international student ratio.<\/p>\n

The performance of individual students isn\u2019t a criterion in any of these rankings. <\/p>\n

Ranking systems are commercial entities. While deeply flawed, they play an increasing role in shaping opinions<\/a> about the quality of tertiary education institutions. But many universities that don\u2019t feature in rankings graduate students who excel in their individual performances. The ranking systems are already heavily contested<\/a>. To only correlate high performing individuals with specific universities is unscientific. Rankings have little to do with individual performance.<\/p>\n

If any ranking system has to be used, it\u2019s been suggested that the Impact Rankings produced by Times Higher Education<\/a> might be more appropriate. This measures universities\u2019 impacts on the 17 UN Sustainable Development Goals. At least, this ranking is more inclusive of global South universities. <\/p>\n

What does this tell us about inequality in higher education?<\/h2>\n

Attending the highly ranked eligible institutions requires the means to pay for fees, accommodation and living costs. For example, almost all the US institutions on the list are private colleges that charge high fees. Many high-performing students from the global South can\u2019t afford to attend. Many brilliant students will, therefore, never be eligible to access the high potential individual visa. <\/p>\n

Universities from Latin America, Africa and most of Asia aren\u2019t on the list of eligible universities. It\u2019s not even possible for many universities to meet the specific criteria chosen. This exclusion sends a negative message. <\/p>\n

The high potential individual visa shows short-sightedness about the experience, insights and skills that graduates from the global South could bring to the UK. Many individuals demonstrate high achievement outcomes, in spite of operating in under-resourced universities. This is due to their resilience and grit \u2013 the strongest predictor of success, according to the studies of American scholar Angel Lee Duckworth<\/a>. <\/p>\n

Should something change?<\/h2>\n

Countries are entitled to make their own decisions. But some countries are making short-term populist decisions, rather than longer term strategic decisions for the benefit of their own citizens and the world. <\/p>\n

The world needs to build relationships for future global collaboration. We need to create, share and disseminate knowledge \u2013 a key lesson of the COVID pandemic. Mobility of higher education students needs to continue. These mobile students need prospects in the countries where they study, as one option, to circulate the global pool of talent. <\/p>\n

The claim from Priti Patel that this visa \u201cputs ability and talent first \u2013 not where someone comes from\u201d doesn\u2019t stand up to scrutiny. The UK is offering an elite visa for well-off graduates from elite institutions to come and stay temporarily in the UK for two to three years. <\/p>\n

The call<\/a> from Rishi Sunak, the UK\u2019s Chancellor of the Exchequer, for students to \u201ctake advantage of this incredible opportunity to forge their careers here\u201d is hardly realistic. A visa of this duration is simply not long enough to genuinely forge a career beyond an initial experience. <\/p>\n

Any person who has just arrived in a new country still has to acclimatise to the culture, find a job and develop relationships before they can start to contribute. <\/p>\n

What are the implications for higher education?<\/h2>\n

The high potential individual visa isn\u2019t particularly going to affect the mobility of students to, and from Africa\u2019s higher education sectors because it\u2019s a work \u2013 not a study \u2013 visa. But it\u2019s a troubling manifestation of a changing value system which is increasingly exclusionary, elitist and undermining of diversity. <\/p>\n

Higher education in Africa is acutely aware of its local challenges. These include the impact of structural social and economic inequality, environmental degradation and climate change in African countries. We know that we cannot have global peace and security if we don\u2019t improve education and job opportunities for all. That is why African universities are concerned with higher education being relevant and solving real problems<\/a> by connecting our research, teaching and learning and community engagement and sharing our knowledge with the world.<\/p>\n

Source: The Conversation<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The UK government\u2019s announcement of a new work visa option aimed at attracting top graduates has elicited some backlash because the list of eligible institutions features no universities from Africa, Latin America or South Asia. The Conversation Africa\u2019s Nontobeko Mtshali asked Orla Quinlan, Director of Internationalisation at Rhodes University in South Africa, to share her […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":229387,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[4584],"tags":[3257],"class_list":{"0":"post-229386","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-africa-news-2","8":"tag-mypr","9":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/06\/uk-work-visa-for-elite-graduates-is-exclusive-and-based-on-flawed-assumptions.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/229386","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=229386"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/229386\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/229387"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=229386"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=229386"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=229386"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}